


The Passion Of Great Souls

by Nevcolleil



Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-04
Updated: 2014-06-04
Packaged: 2018-02-03 08:17:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1737698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nevcolleil/pseuds/Nevcolleil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Captain is cursed and only the blood of a certain grimm will cure him. But where to find such a Grimm, and why ever would one risk himself to save a zauberbeist?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was written in response to a grimm_kink prompt.

As soon as Rosalee announces the verdict - which, really, can't be called anything else - Sean is sure he's going to die alone.

He _will_ die without the cure to this curse, the fuschbau said it herself, and as there's obviously no way for them to procure the main ingredient of the only known countercurse - _ever_ , potentially, but certainly not in the necessary twenty-four hours - Sean would rather not remain in Rosalee's spice shop any longer. Monroe and Rosalee seem genuinely upset that they can't provide him any further assistance; Hank is reluctant to let Sean leave alone, but for all that they've been through together over the past year - despite his long working relationship with Hank - Sean knows that Nick's friends are still primarily Nick's friends. He won't burden them with watching him die. He doesn't want to be seen by them in his final, most weakened moments. He doesn't want to be seen by _Nick_ like that.

"Captain, just wait..." Nick stops him before he can walk out the door. "I'm s-"

"You have nothing to be sorry for, Nick," Sean says honestly. He even manages a smile for his detective. Leave it to maybe the world's one and only peace-loving Grimm to feel responsible for not being able to help Sean in this. As if he could be expected to have the means... Nick is a grown man, who lived for years with a beautiful woman. There's no question that he doesn't meet the... requirements of the remedy Rosalee found in her book. Even if he did, Sean can't say for sure that he'd _let_ Nick do something about it. Their relationship had been strained, at best, since the truth of Sean's heritage came out, right up until Sean nearly died stopping Adalind from trying to steal Nick's powers.

Since then, they've developed a friendship that Sean isn't certain he could willingly give up, even if it meant saving his own life. The success of Sean's fight against his family depends on Nick's support, and - personally - Sean has secretly come to depend upon that support as well. He can't imagine anything could have a more destructive effect on all of the progress that they've made lately than to have Nick feel like their connection obligates him to sacrifice himself for Sean, in any way.

"At least let me mix up something for the pain," Rosalee offers, at the same time that Nick protests, "That's not what I'm saying. I haven't- This is... sort of... difficult to say, but I'm still-"

Monroe pats his friend on the shoulder and looks at him in sympathy. "I know, man. You two have really-" The blutbad casts a sad if awkward glance in Sean's direction. "Why don't we give you a moment alone to talk about it."

"For God's sake..." Nick finally tips his head back, as if praying for strength, and throws his arms out as if in frustration - a gesture at odds with the oddly _embarrassed_ expression on Nick's face. His skin even looks a little pink.

" _I'm still a virgin,_ " Nick announces to the deafening silence that falls over everyone assembled in Rosalee's back room.

"Yeah. You definitely get a moment alone to talk about _that_ ," Monroe says at last.

-v-v-v-v-

"We moved around a lot, when I was a kid. I was in trouble more often than I was out... And Aunt Marie always taught me to be absolutely _sure_ about someone before getting too close to them," Nick explains. He still looks uncomfortable discussing his... status. He smiles with a kind of self-deprecating humor. "Except, for Aunt Marie, giving out your full name and address was 'too close'. Sex was never really an option."

"And when you were living out on your own?" Sean attempts to demonstrate a reasonable level of curiosity... although, when it comes to Nick Burkhardt, Sean's level of 'curiosity' may just be anything but. Finding out this - essentially inconsequential, yet somehow undeniably provocative - tidbit of information doesn't exactly curb his interest.

Nick shrugs, smirks. "Old habits die hard. I guess I just never felt sure about anyone... until Juliet. And, honestly, I was so busy... trying to outlive the record I spent most of my adolescence building up, at least well enough to get into the academy, that it didn't really seem like a priority."

Sean finds himself almost smiling as well. Only the legendary Marie Kessler could raise a young man so disciplined that adolescent hormones didn't "seem like a priority."

"And Juliet?"

Nick releases a long breath. He rubs his face. His expression is inscrutable, as he looks at Sean, until it passes and he's looking wistful and somewhat bashful again.

"We agreed to wait until marriage. You know how that worked out."

Discipline of a Grimm or no, Sean still can't quite wrap his head around that. "But... you owned a home together."

"With two beds," Nick says immediately. "Separate rooms."

"That must have taken a lot of strength of will." Sean can say this much, he's sure, without sounding inappropriate. He could very well mean that it must have taken Nick a lot of strength of will not to seduce Juliette.

Nick need not know that Sean's thoughts are more along the line of how resolute Juliette must have been, to be able to sleep under the same roof as Nick for two years and not succumb to the grimm's considerable charms.

"We managed."

Nick's eyes have gone unreadable again. It isn't as though Juliette has ever been an entirely safe subject between the two of them, but it's still somewhat jarring to be reminded that not long ago, Nick couldn't talk about Juliette with anyone without seeming bitter about their breakup and dejected by that loss. A year ago, Sean couldn't have said her name to Nick without getting a look of jealousy and suspicion in return.

Sean is the first to look away and he clears his throat before trying to move this whole, awkward debacle along.

"And you're sure you want to do this?"

"Save your _life_?" Nick instantly scoffs, which is some comfort. "Uh, _yeah_... Are you joking? Come on, Cap- Sean. Of course I am."

"We're not talking about a small amount of blood, Nick," Sean says, anxiety amping up at the very thought behind his words. "Fueling the countercurse would not be without some risk to you. I read what Rosalee pulled out of that book. In ancient times, the grimm participating in the casting rarely did so voluntarily. They weren't expected to survive losing that much blood."

If anything, Nick looks more determined upon hearing Sean's concerns.

"Well, luckily, these aren't ancient times," he says, chin tilting upwards just slightly in that way that it sometimes does, probably without his noticing. "I'm sure Rosalee can think of a way to make the casting work so that it's safe for the both of us."

Sean hesitates, and then nods. A wave of fondness, unusually strong (fatigue has loosened his normally white-knuckled grip on his emotions) washes over him and his fingers nearly curl into fists. If Rosalee can't, and Nick insists that they still do this - and is harmed - then Sean will not be arresting the Warlock who did this to him - or even administering a more royal brand of justice. He's going to let the zauberbeist tear that bastard apart.

"Ready to let her give it a shot?" Nick asks, looking far too unconcerned, himself, for Sean's tastes.

Sean nods again all the same. He can't do anything about the Warlock currently wreaking havoc on his city if they don't at least try.

-v-v-v-v-

Rosalee, Monroe and Hank help them set up in Sean's apartment, where they'll have more room than they would in the spice shop or the loft that Nick moved into after he and Juliette sold their house.

"If we take this slow, Nick should be able to provide the amount of blood you need to activate the countercurse without any harm to himself," Rosalee says as she instructs Nick and Sean to take off their shirts and lie down on Sean's bed.

They're all adults - it probably shouldn't feel as awkward as it does, climbing into his bed with Nick with the others in the room; they're lying on top of the covers, on opposite sides of the massive king, and Sean must look as awful as he feels. Rosalee's eyes are kind and sympathetic as she watches him struggle out of his button-down with limbs that feel disconnected from his actual body.

Nonetheless, it feels intimate to Sean, after all of the fantasies he's secretly entertained featuring Nick and himself and this bed (under decidedly different circumstances.) And he can't help but worry that the others are picking up on his discomfort and - even worse - speculating correctly on its cause. Neither Monroe nor Hank seem comfortable looking at either Nick or himself simultaneously.

Luckily, Nick doesn't seem to notice anything outside of the IV Monroe hooks up to his left arm and Rosalee's words.

"Will it still work, doing it this slow?" Nick asks, as if he's seriously considering asking Rosalee to speed up the process and take more than he's safe to give if she says no.

Sean frowns, and not just at the prick of Rosalee's needle as she hooks him up to the IV that will allow him to take in Nick's blood.

"It should. It will be... less pleasant, for you, Captain," Rosalee warns, "but it should work just the same as if we bled all that we needed out of Nick at once."

"I can take it," Sean says, even as Nick opens his mouth like he might protest, and sends what is meant to be a quelling glare in Nick's direction for good measure.

Sean doesn't feel very intimidating at the moment, and Nick looks somewhat less than quelled, but he doesn't argue, and Rosalee begins rubbing the slick, pungent mixture she concocted back at the spice shop into Sean's chest. Monroe hands Nick a small pestle and instructs him to cover his own chest with the same.

"Not trying to make things weird or anything, but I gotta say... watching Nick oil up his chest in the Captain's bed isn't exactly how I pictured myself spending my Friday night," Hank says.

Rosalee smiles. "Liar," Nick teases, and out of the corner of his eye Sean catches Nick winking at his partner.

"I think we're a good ways past 'weird' these days, Detective," Sean puts in, smiling - despite everything - at their antics.

"I hear you," says Monroe, taking the pestle back from Nick.

"We'll set up the cauldron at the foot of the bed. You need to take deep breaths once it starts misting," Rosalee tells Sean. "One of us will be here pretty much at all times, so we'll be monitoring you, but if you start to feel a tightness in your chest, Sean, or you, Nick... or if either of you starts seeing dark spots in your vision, one of you needs to let us know right away."

Luckily, tightness in the chest and dark spots aren't two of the symptoms Sean has been experiencing thus far, and he nods through the rest of Rosalee's careful instructions, mentally noting each of the warning signs she tells them to watch out for.

"See, Captain," Nick says, once everything is ready for Rosalee to begin the casting. "I told you she could figure it out."

Sean isn't certain that Nick hasn't just jinxed them by saying as much, twice (they are dealing with warlock magic here, after all) but he feels comforted all the same. A fact that he carefully does not attribute to their adjacent arms, lying a respectable distance away from one another in the center of Sean's bed but nonetheless side-by-side.


	2. Chapter 2

Rosalee warned him that the effects of the curse would get worse before they got _worse_ and then, inevitably, got better. Almost as soon as the cauldron bubbling in the center of Sean's bedroom begins to emit a wispy, green mist, he discovers that Rosalee was telling nothing but the truth.

Sean breathes deeply, as he'd been directed, and notices immediately a tingling, cold feeling entering his limbs where a steady ache had existed before. A light pressure builds behind his eyes, making him drowsy, and it's actually quite pleasant - this momentary relief from the increasing pain of the last two days.

The word 'momentary' is key, however. In seconds, the cold morphs into heat - a searing, almost unbearable heat, flickering over every nerve ending. The pressure in Sean's head increases until he can't turn his head on his pillow.

Involuntarily, Sean lets out a moan.

"Captain?" Nick responds almost immediately to the noise, telling Sean that the grimm hasn't fallen asleep like, presumably, Hank has in the other room - Hank having offered to take the first watch. " _Sean_?"

Sean can't even speak to say that he's fine or that he isn't; his jaw suddenly has no give, locked in position as if with steel bands.

"Oh god." Sean hears Nick fumbling to sit up and turn on the lamp at his side of the bed, a tricky maneuver with an IV hooked to both hand - one attached to Sean's now tremoring but otherwise unmovable form. "Hank!"

Hank is admirably quick to respond to Nick's cry for help. His footsteps are falling heavily on Sean's bedroom floor in seconds, and before Sean passes out, he hears Nick frantically ask Hank to call Rosalee.

The last thing he sees is Nick's face replace the ceiling in Sean's field of vision.

Despite his pain, Sean will remember, later, thinking woozily that at least he has a pleasant image to take with him into oblivion.

-v-v-v-v-v-

Monroe and Rosalee left soon after Rosalee finished casting the countercurse and the cauldron was cooking at the right temperature.

Hank remained in the bedroom for a while, tipped back in one of Sean's dining room chairs, boots resting on the corner of Sean's dresser, and the three of them talked shop, trying to recapture some sense of normal in the midst of everything.

Rosalee called an hour later, however, to check in on them, and recommended that Sean get some rest before the countercurse begins working, so they turned out the lights and Sean directed Hank to the closet where he could find a blanket and pillow.

Sean woke up in the middle of the night, well before the green mist would again wake him, and lay in his bed trying to manage his breathing.

The curse was still doing its awful duty, eating away at him. The pain was one thing - Sean would almost be glad for that, if not for his increasing weakness, which offended him. But the horror of what was being done to Sean, which the pain distracted him from, was the curse's real cruelty. Sean could actually _feel_ himself emaciating. 

Sean looked down at his body, in the dark of the bedroom - broken by the moonlight spilling through an uncovered window -and watched his ribs become minutely more protrusive in his gradually sinking chest. After the dream that had snuck up on him - of himself, healthy as he normally is, and (of course, as if the curse were not torture enough) Nick - this was an even more harrowing sight.

"Captain?" Nick's voice pulled him out of his slowly building panic. "You alright?"

Sean almost laughed at the reminder that Nick actually was with him, if not in the context of his dream. "You're awake?"

"I am now." Apparently it wasn't easy to sleep next to a hyperventilating curse victim. "And if you apologize for waking me up, I'll-"

Sean knew the moment Nick glanced over and saw his condition. The grimm stopped, mid-sentence, and all playfulness fled from his tone. He startled, the sheets rustling around him, as he made as if to sit up.

"What the-"

Sean reached out and grabbed Nick, by the wrist which was all that he could reach, before Nick could do or say anything else. "It's fine."

"It's- This is not _fine_. You're-"

"This is what the curse does." And it was _not_ easy to be calm about that, but Sean talked until Nick relaxed back onto his side of the bed. Until even Sean felt calmer himself, somewhat, by extension. "This is why we're here. It'll be fine."

"Can I do anything? Do you need anything, I mean?"

Sean turned his face and looked at Nick, directly in the face for the first time since they climbed into bed together (it seemed that _not_ looking at him wasn't keeping the fantasies at bay, anyhow) and he smiled. "You're doing enough, don't you think?" Sean glanced, meaningfully, at the tube between them, pumping a steady stream of Nick's blood into Sean's arm.

When Sean looked back into Nick's eyes he froze. His hand was still wrapped around Nick's wrist and yet he felt no pressing inclination to let go. 

Nick's eyes were wide, and impossibly blue, and touchingly full of concern - among other emotions that Sean couldn't quite name.

Sean would blame the curse, later, for his stumbling them into this conversation.

"I'm just thankful that, somehow, you were in the position to help me," Sean said.

Nick was quiet for a moment. Sean would have expected him to look away, but he was glad when Nick didn't. It was fascinating to watch Nick's face change as he spoke of this with the same boyish hesitation that he had before.

"It's not a common choice for a guy to make, I know that," Nick said. "But is it really that hard to believe that I would?"

Sean could have just said, 'yes.' He was exhausted. He was hurting, and he was still somewhat lost in the feelings churned up by this night's dream. Nick's face lay a pillow's breadth away from his own, and Sean was lost in it too.

"Beauty is meant to be appreciated and experienced," he said.

He could see that his answer startled Nick, but Nick didn't move, didn't blink.

Nick said, quietly, "You're saying that sex is beautiful?" He didn't sound skeptical, but careful. Like he wasn't sure what they were talking about. Sean wondered if it even occurred to Nick that Sean might be saying that _Nick_ was beautiful.

"It can be," he said just the same. "It can be ugly. With someone you admire very deeply, whose pleasure you would put above your own, and who regards you the same way, it's one of the most beautiful experiences you can have with another person."

Was he actually lying in bed next to the grimm? Clutching Nick's wrist, still, and talking about sex... For a moment, Sean entertained the notion that he was still dreaming; that the curse had diminished his ability to tell the difference.

Nick licked his lips. Even in the dim moonlight, Sean saw this clearly.

"I'm not sorry," Nick confessed, whether it was the late night or Sean's own, rambling words that prompted him. "That we waited, I mean, Juliette and me. I don't think it would have made a difference. Not the right one, anyway."

"I'm very glad you didn't have sex with Juliette," Sean said without thinking, but Nick just smiled. 

Sean saw his eyes flicker to the IV between them. "Yeah, I bet."

Sean wasn't about to tell Nick that the curse was only half of his reason.

He did say, however: "When you're finally sure that you want to let someone get that close, you'll be glad you didn't rush." Sean could only imagine. Mostly, he was thinking about Nick's virgin status and what the wesson side of him felt about that. Not that it mattered - because he had no reason to believe that He would ever get the chance to touch Nick in such a way - but the zauberbeist in Sean, territorial by nature, was having definite thoughts about the man Sean's secretly desired being untouched by any former lover.

It wasn't until Nick's arm twitched in his grasp that Sean realized he'd begun to slowly stroke the inside of Nick's wrist with his thumb.

It would have been a singularly embarrassing moment, except Sean opened his mouth to apologize and then realized that Nick wasn't pulling away.

"Nick, I-"

"I think we should probably try and get some sleep," Nick interrupted quickly, when Sean would have said something else (no doubt even less helpful in diffusing the situation).

Nick sounded almost as wary then as he does now, though less urgent and much less demanding.

Nick's voice comes to Sean in snippets, between pain-induced lapses in consciousness.

"-ing to bring down his fever? Hank, he's burning up," Sean hears Nick say once.

Later, he hears Hank respond, "-lee says just to keep putting more on. He's gotta keep breathing it in."

Nick sounds almost angry as he and Hank - and Rosalee? - discuss Sean's condition.

Sean feels things, as well, off and on. A hand on his brow... on his chest, again and again. He thinks he's dreaming when he catches the hand and Nick's voice comes from just next to Sean's left ear. 

"I gotta rub some more of this in, Captain. It'll just take a minute, alright?"

Nick's asking something, but Sean can't interpret the question. He can't place the herbal smell that's suddenly enveloped him.

"Don't stop," he says, because the hand stroking him is the best thing he's felt in the duration of his cloudy memory.

"I won't," Nick's voice says an undetermined time later.

"Just keep breathing, Sean," Sean thinks he hears. There's an odd tone to Nick's voice that he's too out of it to fathom. "Just keep breathing, you hear me? Don't you fucking stop."

Sean thinks he promises not to, but he isn't certain if this is real or part of the dream also.

Nick's voice follows him in and out of wakefulness.

"Just stay with us, okay? Stay with me, Sean."

"I'm not going anywhere," Sean says when he can.


End file.
